{"id":120897,"date":"2025-07-22T21:03:04","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T20:03:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/?p=120897"},"modified":"2025-07-22T21:03:04","modified_gmt":"2025-07-22T20:03:04","slug":"lg-elections-travesty-of-democracy-below-acceptable-benchmark-csos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/news\/lg-elections-travesty-of-democracy-below-acceptable-benchmark-csos\/","title":{"rendered":"LG elections, travesty of democracy, below acceptable benchmark \u2013 CSOs\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>By Myke Agunwa<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>As stakeholders continue to evolve political strategies aimed at strengthening democratic institutions in the country, several non-governmental organizations are in agreement that most Local Government (LG) elections fall short of electoral integrity.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Recall that on July 11, 2024, the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government should not release local government allocations to states that have no democratically elected leaders at the local government, including councils governed by caretaker committees appointed by governors.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The court also ordered that allocations to the local governments should be paid directly to the local council treasury.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Since the pronouncement, many states hurriedly started conducting local government elections.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Commenting on outcomes of recent local government elections, The Executive Director of Yiaga Africa, Samson Itodo, who spoke during a dialogue on local governance reforms, one year after the court\u2019s judgment, convened by Agora Policy at the Shehu Musa Yar\u2019Adua Centre in Abuja on Tuesday, said that the electoral results were manipulated in favour of the party in power.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>He lamented that LG elections conducted after the supreme court\u2019s landmark ruling on LG autonomy were a \u201ctravesty\u201d of electoral democracy.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Itodo recalled that only 14 states had elected local councils before the court verdict, noting that the judgment triggered a rush by the remaining states to conduct LG elections.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cIn fact, in 2024, we classified October as the super month of local government elections in the country because all the states rushed to conduct elections,\u201d Itodo said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cBut the question is not in the conduct of the elections; it\u2019s the quality of the polls. And as of last year, and after the Lagos elections, we concluded that all those elections were a travesty of electoral democracy, and they don\u2019t meet the electoral integrity test.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cWhat we saw was the allocation of votes in most of those elections. That is, states and their officials would sit and allocate votes. And in most of the states, the ruling party swept all the seats.\u201d<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Also speaking at the event, Bello Yandaki, national president of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON), Bello Yansaid the court ruling has improved fiscal scrutiny at the local level.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>According to him, many local government chairpersons are now subject to investigations by anti-corruption agencies such as the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cYou know that the local government chairpersons do not have immunity, so it\u2019s easy for you to hold them to account. Not that you have to wait until after his three-year term, or in some cases, four-year term, before they can be held to account,\u201d Yandaki said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cThere are a lot of local government chairmen going to EFCC and ICPC daily to answer questions regarding fiscal accountability in their local government.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cSo, if there is any tier of government where you can expect accountability\u2014because they will be held to account because of lack of immunity\u2014it\u2019s the local government.\u201d<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Yandaki added that ALGON is working to build the capacity of local officials to manage public resources in more transparent and impactful ways.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>On her part, Saudatu Mahdi, secretary-general of the Women\u2019s Rights Advancement and Protection Alternative (WRAPA), said limited awareness remains a barrier to civic participation in local governance.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>She said WRAPA\u2019s research showed that over 50 percent of Nigerians \u2014 and up to 66 percent of women and persons with disabilities \u2014 lack basic information about the reforms and how they can participate.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Earlier in her welcome remarks, Ojobo Atuluku, chair of Agora Policy, said sustained reforms at the local level must go beyond court rulings and be backed by political will and civic mobilisation.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u00a0\u201cOur goal is to provide a platform for frank dialogue, policy learning, and cross-sector collaboration,\u201d she said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cEach of you holds a piece of the reform puzzle, and only together can we advance sustainable and equitable governance. We recognise that policy change does not come by court rulings alone. It requires political will, institutional capacity, and civic influence.\u201d<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The event was supported by the MacArthur Foundation and organised in collaboration with African Cities Research Consortium (ACRC), TheCable and the Centre for Fiscal Transparency and Public Integrity (CFTPI).<\/div>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Related Posts generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Myke Agunwa As stakeholders continue to evolve political strategies aimed at strengthening democratic institutions in the country, several non-governmental organizations are in agreement that most Local Government (LG) elections&hellip;<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Related Posts generic via filter on wp_trim_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":120898,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-120897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.8 - 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